Midwest Permaculture's Certifying Instructors
Bill Wilson is co-founder of Midwest Permaculture and has been teaching permaculture for 5 years. He holds PDC and Advanced Permaculture Design Certificates and took his Permaculture Teacher Training with Jude Hobbs of the Permaculture Institute USA. He has co-taught and hosted over 25 PDC Courses.
Wayne Weiseman is a naturalist, gardener, farmer, eco-builder, permaculturist and experienced teacher. He has been registered to teach the PDC Curriculum by Bill Mollison of the Permaculture Research Institute of Australia.
Regardless of credentials, experience or training, both Bill and Wayne receive almost unanimous feedback from students as being excellent teachers. More importantly, the fact that so many of our graduates return home enthusiastic and competent enough to begin to apply what they have learned to their own property tells us that our trainings are accomplishing what Bill Mollison intended for his trainings to be.
PDC Certification
Students completing one of our our courses receive a numbered and recorded PDC Certificate from Midwest Permaculture, signed by either Bill Wilson, Wayne Weiseman, or both.
What Does Design Course Certificate Enable you to Do?
With this certificate you may confidently use the word 'permaculture' in the promotion of your work or business. This might include permaculture design consulting, doing design work, implementing designs on the ground for land and homeowners and all sorts of teaching.
"..they gave me a job as soon as they looked at my resume with that “Permaculture Design Certified” right at the top!"
Amy - Loveland, CO |
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Please Note However: Certification states the obvious, that you have successfully completed the full 72-hour design course curriculum. This does not make you (or any of us) "Certified Permaculture Designers" as some people assume or think.
To our knowledge, there is no agency or program that certifies someone as an "official-licensed-permaculture designer". The PDC Certificate only implies that one has satisfactorily completed a specified training and now has the legitimate permission to consider themselves a 'permaculturist', skilled or not, and to offer their design abilities to others.
If a PDC-certificate holder feels that they are ready to offer permaculture designs, they may certainly do so and call themselves a 'permaculture designer', but it is inaccurate to our understanding for someone to call themselves a 'certified' permaculture designer. Ultimately, each individual decides for themselves if and when they feel qualified to declare themselves a permaculture designer following the completion of a PDC certificate training.
If you do move into designing, what you charge is up to you and the people you do the design work for. However, since the quality of your design work and service reflects upon the entire permaculture community, we encourage everyone to operate with the integrity and openness which is at the heart of this work.
What About Teaching Permaculture Classes?
Absolutely. PDC certification allows you to teach permaculture classes in whatever subjects you feel knowledgeable and capable of. We suggest new graduates start with 1-3 hour classes and work their way up to half-day, full-day and then weekend trainings. Mollison's over-reaching desire (as well as that of the world permaculture community) is that teachers leave students with a greater understanding and confidence in their ability to design permanent systems that will care for themselves, others and the planet.
If you have the ability to do this.... Please Teach...!!!
What about Teaching Permaculture Design Certificate Courses and Offering "Certificates" to Others?
From our research and understanding, there is no single, legal or established entity in the United State or the world that grants official PDC teacher certification or determines teacher qualifications. There are entities or organizations that do this but this is a system they have set up to support their students, their teachers and their institutions.
The accepted tradition in the Permaculture community is for those aspiring to teach PDC Courses and offer their own certificate of completion to their graduating students is to first take an advanced permaculture training themselves that specializes in the art of teaching permaculture.
Maybe this will change in the future, but we hope not. The original gift of Permaculture by Bill Mollison and David Holmgren was to get knowledge and opportunity into the hands of the many and away from a hierarchal or institutional approach to sharing this life enhancing work.
Why?
Once an educational curriculum and a course of progressive study becomes 'institutionalized', some of those who could potentially become some of the best teachers may become marginalized or disqualified from teaching because of their inability to pay for training and/or certification. This process also ends up permitting poor teachers who happen to have the financial resources for multiple trainings and certifications, to take a place in a hierarchal educational structure who then end up garnering students and resource because of their apparent 'qualifications'. Jumping through the hoops of the educational process often can become the focus of aspiring teachers, just moving through the educational ranks, rather than having the primary goal of becoming a really good teacher.
Bottom line: If any PDC Course Graduate has the ability to deliver a quality 72-hour PDC Course that includes all aspects of the PDC Curriculum (as outlined in Mollison's: Permaculture - A Designer's Manual) they have the right to do so and to offer their own PDC Certificates to their graduating students.
The best way we know of to become a quality PDC Teacher is to become a co-teacher and/or assistant at other PDC Courses and take an advanced permaculture training in teaching.
The Opportunity Before Us...
Because permaculture is a relatively new field, there are few 'job' opportunities listed in the employment ads for permaculture designers. Please do not take a PDC course thinking there will be an automatic job for you at the other end.
The opportunity however is that design course graduates have the right to start their own business immediately, whether it be in consulting, designing, design implementation or teaching. The only thing holding one back would be a persons knowledge base, experience and personal skills, all of which are available to everyone to learn and develop if we but step into it.
Permaculture is a life-long journey and a way of relating to life. There is no end to the depth of experience and service we might render to ourselves, our communities and the world, especially given the current state of things. We need people who are able to think and design in terms on long-term sustainable solutions. For those who can do this, there appears to be great opportunity, ultimate security and the satisfaction of doing work that really does matter in the world.
This work is real. This work is lasting. This work is needed.
Bill Wilson - April 2011
From April of 2010
Bill Mollison and the Permaculture Institute of Australia sent an email to Wayne Weiseman and all their registered teachers world wide, stating that they are going to discontinue their teachers registry.
Our Thoughts...
How does one contain or control something as foundational as a permaculture approach to living and to life? Here are Mollison's thoughts from his book "Travels in Dreams" from 1996...
"Finally, with hundreds on itinerant teachers turning up anywhere,
the system is beyond restraint.
Safe at last, and in a geometric growth rate - we have won!
Permaculture is permanently ungovernable."
- Midwest Permaculture
